By Denny Gulino

WASHINGTON (MNI) – Surveying the wreckage left by the financial
crisis, the Fed finds continuing caution among the Boomer generation
such that it’s likely to be an additional factor slowing overall
recovery, Federal Reserve Gov. Elizabeth Duke said Thursday night.

“Some of the effects of recent economic turmoil may result in a
longer period of economic adjustment than has been the case in past
recession, as fundamental attitudes appear to have shifted,” she said in
remarks prepared for the Virginia Association of Economists in Richmond.

No matter what their experience during the financial crisis, “This
likely suggests increased uncertainty about the future,” she said.

She was referring to initial results gleaned from the Fed’s survey
of “microlevel” information on American family finances reported earlier
in the day. Although done every three years, this round of the survey
was particularly aimed at the consequences of the crisis, given its
participants were the same as those in 2007 before the crisis.

In 2007 this group, whose median income then was $53,000 and
average income $84,000, counted their total wealth as amounting to less
than six months of their usual income.

The extent of the damage then was, she said, “extraordinary by any
measure,” quantified in the survey as taking away six months or more of
their usual income.

“Almost a third saw a loss greater than an entire year of their
usual income,” Duke said. Yet even while such big percentages were being
hit hard as the value of their houses and investments were marked down,
“more than a fifth of families saw a gain in wealth that was greater
than six months of their usual income.”

Duke focused on what she called the preretirement age group, those
between 50 and 61 years old in 2007, part of the baby-boom generation
that “by virtue of its sheer size, has had an outsized influence on the
economy as it has entered every stage in the life cycle,” she said.

Their behavioral shift’s “significant effects on the performance of
the U.S. economy” has been negative as 49% of this age group saw a
decline of more than six months of their usual income, a more severe hit
than for the population of families overall.

So this group, intent on accumulating assets to carry them through
retirement, instead saw their retirement goal moving farther into the
future. “In 2009, more than two thirds of the preretirement group
reported that their expected retirement age was at least a year later
than what they reported in 2007,” she said.

Uncertainty, increased caution, less willingness to take on risk,
precautionary savings all became more pronounced “regardless of whether
the change was a gain or a loss,” she said.

Emphasizing the point, Duke reiterated, “Boomer families remained
cautious or grew more cautious about spending out of their asset gains,
regardless of whether they experienced significant losses during the
crisis.”

That suggests, she went on, that this group was changing its
behavior not only based on its own experiences but as a “result from
observations of changes to the circumstances of others.”

This circular reinforcement of caution derived from their
observations of others suggests “that the relationship between the
saving rate and household wealth might be even more persistent than in
the past.”

Another subset more hard hit than the population of families in
general was that composed of business owners. “Fifty-seven percent of
business owners saw substantial losses in their net worth relative to
their usual income,” again compared to 43% over the overall group.

Those families in construction, as most were in the survey, “were
the most likely to see a substantial decline in net worth.” Those,
however, involved in wholesale or retail business “were more likely to
see a substantial gain.”

Only 82% of the consumers who reported owning a business in 2007
were still owners of a business in 2009. Whether losers or winners, they
all faced the same increase in the denials of credit applications.

“The striking similarity in credit approval rates for business loan
requests by business owners who gained and those who lost wealth would
seem to support anecdotal reports at the time — that business credit
was hard to obtain even for good borrowers,” Duke said.

Preretirement-aged families “who gained and those who lost wealth
during the financial crisis generally appear to act as if they has lost
wealth,” she said. And the reaction to “wealth shocks” “could be a
factor in the slow recovery of spending.”

The survey suggests changes in behavior that prolong the path to
recovery but she said “it is still too early to determine how consumer
spending patterns will ultimately be altered.”

** Market News International Washington Bureau: 202-371-2121 **

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